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Jack.
He yanked me out and toward him like some kind of machine, grabbing me around the waist and clamping me with an oof to his chest, then dragged me back to the bank so fast, we both stumbled and fell onto the sandy shore.
Did he land on top of me like we were in From Here to Eternity?
Yes, that happened.
Was it in any way romantic like that?
Um. No.
As soon as he could, Jack scrambled up and stomped away, leaving me drenched, and stunned, and coughing on the sand.
When I caught my breath, I said, “What was that? A riptide?”
“Are you kidding me?” he demanded, his jeans soaking wet from the thighs down. “Did you just wade out into the Brazos? Did that just happen?”
I stood up and tried unsuccessfully to brush the wet sand off my legs. “Was I… not supposed to do that?”
“Nobody’s supposed to do that! Don’t you know how many people drown in that river every year?”
“Why would I know that?”
“Everybody knows that! Never swim in the Brazos.”
“First of all, I wasn’t swimming. And second—no. That’s not a thing everybody knows.”
But Jack was ranting now. “And why? Why can’t you swim in the Brazos? Because it’s sandy at the bottom, and so the current makes eddies, and the eddies carve caverns in that sandy floor of the river, and the current swirls around in there like liquid tornadoes—and if you’re unlucky or stupid enough to get sucked into one, you’re done for.”
“That’s some pretty specialized knowledge, there—” I started, coughing some more.
“So,” Jack went on, like I wasn’t even talking, “when idiots decide to go swimming or fishing or wading in that water, the next thing they know, they’re pulled into the undertow. Whole families die trying to save each other, one by one!”
Did he just call me an idiot? I tried to decide if it was worse than being the epitome of ordinary. “So. Not a riptide then.”
I eyed the water, so tranquil looking from here. I could still feel the pull of it, like some liquid death magnet. Suddenly there were shivers prickling my arms and legs. “Scary,” I said, almost to myself.
My calmness just seemed to make him madder.
“Scary?” Jack yelled. “You’re damn right! What the hell were you thinking?”
“I don’t know,” I said, turning to him now. “I was hot? The water felt nice?”
“You were hot?” he said, in a tone like he’d asked me why I was drinking gasoline and I told him I was thirsty.
He went on. “Do you have a death wish? Do you? Because here’s why it’s called ‘the Brazos.’ From ‘los brazos de Dios,’ which means ‘the arms of God’—and people think it’s from thirsty travelers who were so grateful to find water, but it’s actually because it drowned so many people that it’s where God collects their souls.”
Yikes. Okay. That took a dark turn.
I will grant that Jack was conveying an important safety tip. But, I mean, really? I was obviously half-drowned and super-shaken. Did he have to yell?
I don’t know about you, but I can only get yelled at for so long before I start yelling back. Jack wanted to yell? Fine. I could yell, too. I could yell all day.
“Why are you yelling at me?!” I yelled.
Another first for me—yelling at a client.
“Because!” Jack yelled back. “You’re going to get yourself killed!”
